What’s Life Like After Local News?

PHOTOS OF DAVID JOHNSON, SALLY WIGGIN, STACY SMITH, KELLY FREY AND HAROLD HAYES BY LAURA PETRILLA. PHOTO OF DARIETH CHISHOLM COURTESY. PHOTO OF SONNI ABATTA COURTESY.

There’s a special relationship that Pittsburghers have with local television news stars.

“Whenever I come back to Pittsburgh, I run into people, and they remember me,” says Darieth Chisolm, who anchored and reported at WPXI for 20 years before leaving in 2013. “They grew up watching me. It’s kind of very hard to get a face out of your brain that you went to bed with every night.”

It’s a kind of intimacy that feels really particular to this city, says Pittsburgh Tribune-Review reporter Rob Owen, who has been covering television in Pittsburgh since 1998.

“It’s not exactly a universal phenomenon,” Owen says. “If you go to places on the East Coast and the West Coast, there’s not nearly the interest in local TV personalities.”

But the relationship between viewers and local anchors feels both deeply personal and utterly Pittsburgh. “You invite them into your home,” Owen says. “So there’s a sense that you have this kind of relationship with the people on TV. And you could run into them at Giant Eagle.”

In other words: Pittsburghers don’t just watch local TV — they care about it. Owen calls it “a market where the people on TV are celebrities.” And they stay celebrities, long after they’ve left the airwaves.

We caught up with some of our favorite anchors and reporters to see what life after local news has looked like for each of them.

David Johnson

PHOTO BY LAURA PETRILLA

At 68, former WPXI mainstay David Johnson is happily busy in retirement and very much at home in Pittsburgh. A Florida native who grew up in Daytona Beach, Johnson’s career took him to stints in Chattanooga, Tennessee; Orlando, Florida; and Atlanta before landing at Channel 11 as the noon anchor in 1985, beginning a remarkable 40-year run at the station.

“WPXI took a chance because I was 27 at the time, and they could get me for cheap,” Johnson says. “Bill Burns was still on the air with [his daughter] Patti [Burns], and they were known as ‘Patti and Daddy.’ And I was going up against them at noon. So I accepted the job, and before I left Atlanta, I went out to have a drink at a bar with a friend of mine, and I was talking about my new job. And, of course, there’s a Pittsburgher there. He overhears our conversation, and he says to me, ‘What show are you going to? What station?’ And he laughed and he said, ‘Patti and Daddy are gonna kick your ass.’ And I said, ‘What do you mean?’ And he goes, ‘You’ll find out.’ And I did — he was right. The ratings were unbelievable for their newscast, and they did, indeed, kick my ass.”

Eventually, Johnson was moved to evenings and anchored the news for decades alongside Peggy Finnegan until her retirement in 2020. Johnson announced his retirement last year; his last day at Channel 11 was in December 2024.

These days, Johnson splits his time between family, friends and a pleasantly low-key routine. Mornings often include coffee and headlines, and then shooting hoops at the Homewood-Brushton Y (“I can still shoot”), a long walk around the Highland Park Reservoir or a quick trip to the driving range. He’s a regular at the Manor Theatre and unabashed about solo movie nights.

One son now teaches Italian at The Ohio State University; the other works on the podcast “The Daily” for The New York Times. Johnson keeps up with former colleagues over breakfasts at Pamela’s Diner and lunches with weather and anchor buddies. He’s mulling voice work or teaching and is open to volunteering again. As he puts it, retirement isn’t just “shooting baskets” — it’s the next chapter in the city he calls home.

Darieth Chisolm

PHOTO COURTESY OF DARIETH CHISOLM

Darieth Chisolm may have left Pittsburgh, but the city hasn’t left her. After stepping away from TV more than a decade ago, she turned a private trauma into service. Chisholm made the award-winning documentary “50 Shades of Service,” an exploration of revenge porn, cyberbullying and online sexual assault, after an ex-boyfriend threatened to release intimate photos and videos that he had been secretly taking without her knowledge or permission.

“It served its purpose and supported people through their own experience,” Chisholm says.

Advocacy led to a new focus: healing and raising consciousness. Now based in Detroit (after a stop in Miromar Lakes, Florida and a 2020 return to her hometown to be near her mother before her death), Chisolm spent a few years traveling to study psychedelics, heart-brain coherence, neuroscience, spirituality, meditation, vegan food and Kundalini yoga. She’s currently writing a book, “Awakening the Prosperous Human,” about cultivating a prosperous life of “joy and peace and love and happiness,” not money.

Today she hosts one-on-one coaching sessions and a small community called Soul Circle, facilitating conversation about awakening and channeling guidance. She travels a ton (she’s closing in on visiting all 50 states) and spends a lot of time doing yoga. Her life, Chisholm says, looks very different from when she was in the business.

“I was cleaning out my stuff, and I started pulling out all of the news articles that I’ve been featured in over the years,” she says. “I just literally started crying out of the absolute appreciation for the life that I lived, but I’m so far away from that. I’m looking at an old ‘25 Most Beautiful People in Pittsburgh’ story and thinking, ‘Who is this chick?’”

Sally Wiggin

PHOTO BY LAURA PETRILLA

The undisputed queen of local news in Pittsburgh, Sally Wiggin spent nearly four decades at WTAE before retiring in 2018. She joined Channel 4 in 1980 and became one of the most recognizable faces — and voices — in the city, anchoring each of the station’s newscasts as well as co-anchoring Steelers pre-and-post game specials, becoming a fixture of Pittsburgh’s football Sundays.

These days, Wiggin pours her time into the boards and causes closest to her heart. She served on the board of the Pittsburgh Zoo & Aquarium for decades and remains an active champion for wildlife and conservation, a passion that has taken her to Africa multiple times and will soon take her back to Antarctica with a zoo colleague to see penguins in the wild. In addition, she sat on the Humane Animal Rescue board for years and is now on its advisory board. She also sits on the board of the Highmark Caring Foundation/Caring Place, where she frequently donates her time as an emcee, most recently for events at the Heinz History Center.

Wiggin’s volunteerism extends beyond meeting rooms and microphones. After returning from South Georgia in 2018, she began working hands-on with the zoo’s penguins as a docent, deepening her connection to animal care and education. You’ll still find her lending her name and presence to local fundraisers — including a recent Haitian-focused nonprofit event, and championing efforts that support food, education and community well-being. In her (limited) spare time? She’s visiting friends or taking riding lessons.

“I may be retired from television news, but never from Pittsburgh,” she says.

Stacy Smith

PHOTO BY LAURA PETRILLA

After 50 years in broadcasting, Stacy Smith signed off from KDKA in May 2021, closing a career that began in 1971, when a campus radio newscast at Ball State University led to his first job in Muncie, Indiana. From there, he climbed steadily through markets — Indianapolis, Louisville, Kansas City — before arriving in 1983 in Pittsburgh, where he would spend nearly four decades anchoring the news at KDKA with calm authority and his signature civility.

“I liked the city right from the beginning,” he says. “People welcomed me into their homes. I always remembered that in Pittsburgh, they’re good people.” Smith became a trusted voice through major stories and found his niche in long-form journalism, co-hosting “KD/PG Sunday Edition” and later his own segment, “Around the Table with Stacy Smith.”

Now retired from daily news, Smith hasn’t stepped away from storytelling. He continues to host two podcasts, “Trunk ’N Tails,” on politics, and “The Bull, the Bear and You,” about investing. He recently reunited with his longtime co-anchor Patrice King Brown for a series of “Medicare For the Record” podcasts for UPMC For Life.

“Podcasting keeps me busy and keeps me up-to-date on everything that’s going on in the world,” he says. “It’s really allowed me to keep doing what I love in the form of long-form journalism and bringing people together to talk — through civil conversations, not shouting matches.”

Kelly Frey

PHOTO BY LAURA PETRILLA

After more than two decades as a beloved morning anchor at WTAE, Kelly Frey has fully embraced a new chapter that she’s built around family, flexibility and real estate. Since leaving television news, Frey has become a full-time agent with Berkshire Hathaway, channeling the energy and poise that once carried her through breaking news into helping clients find their next home.

“I didn’t know exactly what I wanted to do when I left news,” she says. “But I’m a Type-A personality. I like to get up, get ready and have a purpose every day.”

Her days are very busy. Frey’s business is thriving, which she credits to the relationships that she built and the trust she earned from longtime viewers who now call her their agent. “Real estate is a lot like news,” she says. “You tell stories, you connect with people, you work under pressure. It was such a natural transition.”

She’s also the ambassador for The Skin Center, and she says her promotional commercials will be coming out soon.

Away from work, Frey is focused on her family. She and her husband, Jason, stay busy raising their two children, 14-year-old daughter Marena and 16-year-old son Bennett; he was born with Dandy-Walker syndrome, a congenital brain malformation, and hydrocephalus, and requires round-the-clock care.

There also are other projects that keep her busy, including a rental home in Bethany Beach, Delaware, designed with accessibility in mind. She still finds time for the occasional photo or video shoot.

“You get up, you get ready, and you go … It’s not an option not to move forward,” she says. “You just do it.”

Harold Hayes

PHOTO BY LAURA PETRILLA

After nearly four decades as one of Pittsburgh’s most respected reporters, Harold Hayes, who retired from KDKA in 2016, has shifted gears while still remaining connected to journalism and his community.

Now 72, Hayes calls Squirrel Hill home, where he and Iris, his wife of 41 years, have lived since 1987. Though he jokes that life is “less exciting and less challenging,” in retirement, he continues to lend his voice and experience to projects that keep storytelling alive.

Hayes serves on the board of the National Museum of Broadcasting, a new Pittsburgh initiative led by former colleagues, and helps maintain a producer database for the National Association of Black Journalists, encouraging younger journalists to grow into newsroom leaders. He’s also a regular speaker on Black history and family heritage, drawing on his McKeesport roots; his grandfather was a Pullman porter and his father a Baptist minister.

While he admits he doesn’t miss chasing verdicts in the rain, Hayes says he still treasures the camaraderie and sharp wit that defined his newsroom days. These days, he keeps a thoughtful distance from the fast-changing media world.

“When I hear certain headlines now, it just reinforces that, thank God I am not dealing with some of this stuff,” he says. “It’s just the opposite of the world I came up in. I did my best to give balance. And if I was working now, I would try to do that, but I think it would be increasingly difficult.”

Sonni Abatta

PHOTO COURTESY OF SONNI ABATTA

Sonni Abatta still lights up when she talks about Pittsburgh. “No one is like a Pittsburgher — the warmth is unmatched,” she says. A Carnegie Mellon University grad, she started at KDKA at age 21 and spent more than six years as a reporter and anchor for the station before later moving to Orlando, Florida where she was the main evening anchor at the Fox affiliate. She signed off for a final time in 2016 while she was pregnant with her third child and left the business for good.

Since then, Abatta has stayed close to storytelling while building a flexible life for family in Orlando, where she stayed. She freelanced as a host, moderated local political debates and launched the podcast “We Gotta Talk.” This is aimed largely toward women and mixes “serious and superficial” news and lifestyle coverage, with an emphasis on health, parenting, beauty and wellness. Each Monday, her Substack newsletter (sign up at sonniabatta.substack.com) delivers “news for normies,” three big stories distilled with context from sources that lean both left and right; three additional weekly mailings keep things lighter.

“I want people informed without feeling overwhelmed,” she says, emphasizing media literacy and balance over opinion. “It’s really fun, and it’s been representative of who I both am and who I think my readers want to be,” she says. “It’s informed, but it’s also fun and lighthearted.”

Emily Catalano, a frequent contributor to Pittsburgh Magazine, is a former TV journalist. She is the founder and editor of Good Food Pittsburgh and owns Highly Social Media, a creative content agency.